ButchersWife I have a couple of metres of a nice sparkly red and green tartan with gold shot through it that I use some years - I have never got as far as actually hemming it or getting it into a proper tree skirt shape at all - I literally just drape it, and add a few (hidden) pins if needed some years to hold the shape. That may work well, if you get enough fabric, and you can then use it another time to actually make something if the "thing under the tree" will be gone before next Christmas so you won't need that long a tree skirt in future.
Seasonal gins?
Well, sloe gin is pick berries, wash, freeze to allow skins burst (or skip that step if feeling lazy), throw into a large kilner jar with a good helping of sugar, cover in cheap gin (Lidl's version or Sainsbury's basics both work well), shake daily for a few days to allow sugar to dissolve, then ignore for at least 6 weeks. Shake on occasion helps. Taste after maybe 3-4 weeks, and add more sugar if necessary. When ready to bottle, pour gin into large jug/bowl through sieve, capturing berries. Then pour into naice bottles (clean, preferably sterilized but with alcohol that's less important than jams/chutnies or mincemeat), cover, label. Present with a smile.
Raspberry or rhubarb are similar (I chop the rhubarb up into chunks, and sometimes add some diced ginger to that which is nice). I keep meaning to try blackberry.
Limoncello is similar as well but the peels (very thinly peeled using veg peeler to just get zest and not the pith) of 15 lemons to 1 bottle of vodka. The recipe I have calls for the sugar to be dissolved into a sugar syrup in hot water, cooled and added at day 40 - I prefer to just throw in spoonfuls of sugar on day 1 (and do the shaking trick above daily until dissolved) and also add the juice of the lemons as the extra liquid rather than water. After 80 days (roughly!), sieve through muslin or a coffee filter to capture the lemon juice bits and zest, and bottle. Serve well chilled, with some lemonade is nice as a long drink, or neat as a short to sip after dinner (like an amaretti or port).
I tested my sloe gins last night as it happens (I was looking at my drink cupboards and wondering about getting some more when down "home" soon - as time is very short this year). 2015 is perfect (about 2 glasses left), but 2017 is quite bitter, so I will pop that whole batch back in my kilner jar instead with the extra sugar needed, for an extra few weeks. I have a small amount of a previous batch (maybe 2013) but that one is quite sediment at the bottom, so I think I will have to try and strain it through a coffee filter again.
I am thinking about getting out our "Old Faithful" again this year (IR£20 in Penneys/Primark, 19 years ago!) - putting it in the playroom and having a more eclectic/bright theme in there, and a proper traditional red/green/natural theme in the sitting room on the naice Balsam Hill tree we got last year. I certainly have enough decorations to do 2!
I may be shot for having paper napkins on the Poncetastic board, but I bought mine yesterday, as I saw some lovely ones on a business trip! They are dark blue, with a lovely festive pattern, and will match my Denby Imperial Blue ware really nicely. So that decides the Christmas table - the red and gold chargers will be used another year. And I can find dark blue dinner candles relatively easily if I look early enough, or plain white or silver if I leave it too late.
I'm almost finished the poncetastic gifts list - I am going to acknowledge I probably won't get enough time to sew my list, so will buy for DCs (various DNieces and DNephews), and sew next year for them. But the knitting for adult DSiblings (mine and DH's) and their various DHs/DWs/DPs is on track and should be finished on time.
Less than 11 weeks, but all is looking on track at present.